Photo Record

Catalog Number

2007.010.017

Caption

W.T. Preston machinery, Oct. 1981

Description

W. T. PRESTON pipes, gauges and valves, October 1981.

The wood-hulled snagboat W. T. PRESTON was built c. 1929, using some components (sternwheel and engines) of the vessel it replaced, the SWINOMISH. The W. T. PRESTON, named for the only civilian engineer then working for the Corps of Engineers, served the Corps form 1929 to 1939, pulling snags out of Puget Sound waterways and local rivers. A new steel-hulled, 163' W. T. PRESTON was then built at the Lake Union Drydock in Seattle, again using material from the wooden boat it replaced. In 1981 the W. T. PRESTON, "last Puget Sound sternwheeler" was retired. She went on display in Anacortes in 1983.